The Church and the Holy Roman Empire
1. The ecclesiastical organization
During the High Middle Ages , the clergy found itself divided into secular and regular . The secular clergy was made up of priests, deacons, bishops, metropolitans, patriarchs and the pope. His name was secular because its components were living in contact with the saeculum (non-ecclesiastical world). But the regular clergy was composed of monks, followers of a rule that preached essentially chastity, poverty and charity. This clergy proposed to a more spiritual behavior and the rejection of worldly things, material.
The clergy who first organized was secular;regular emerged as a reaction to that. The first monks appeared in the Roman Empire in the third century. But it was St. Benedict of Nursia who organized the Monte Cassino (Italy) the first monastery, which was proposed in addition to the normal vote, obedience, productive work and prayers. It was the Benedictine rule. For this rule, the monks should obey the abbot of the monastery chief, chosen by the monks themselves.
In social terms, in a global manner, we can divide the clergy in high and low. The high clergy was composed of members of the feudal nobility who took bishops or abbots.The lower clergy was more modest origin, consisting of priests and monks. Any Christian could enter the clergy, except the servants, as they were bound to the land they cultivated.
The rule of choice of abbots by the monks, bishops and the elders was not followed during the Middle Ages. The bishops were invested in his duties by earls, dukes, kings and emperors.Thus, the chosen were not always regulated life, as it would be appropriate to a religious.
Were actually ecclesiastical lords who enjoyed the income of bishoprics and abbeys received from overlords lay as fief, as being required to meet the normal duties of any vassal. This lay investiture had harmful repercussions on the clergy. The bishops and abbots had immoral life for a religious and negatively influenced the lower clergy, leading the monks to marry or have lovers. This moral profligacy of the clergy is called Nicolaitanism (because Nicholas, a bishop, preached the right to marriage of the clergy). Another problem is due to simony, which was to negotiate sacred things - including the ecclesiastical offices.
By the tenth century, they began the reaction of movements within the Church against the lay investiture, simony and Nicolaitanism, leading to the Quarrel of Investiture (struggle between the German emperors and the Papacy).
2. The Christianization of Europe
The Christianization process in Europe was very slow. It reached the century V to XI. It is divided into two stages: baptism and conversion. Baptism was the initial phase, in which only the leaders of the Germanic tribes were baptized, considering the extensive ceremony to his men. The hardest thing was to convert, that is, teach the doctrine (dogma, moral and bonds).
The role of the Papacy in this religious enterprise was huge. Began with Pope Gregory the Great (590-604), true political leader and religious of Rome, supreme ruler of all Christendom. Gregory tried to reunite the Christian churches and monasteries around the Western world and separated by the invasions of the fifth century stimulated the faith of the clergy and the religious culture through writings as the Pastoral Rule. Also composed hymns, called Gregorian chant .
Gregory encouraged the conversion of the pagans and the Christians of the Arian sect, ie Year heresy of supporters bishop who preached that Christ is a creature of just human nature.
For its stimulus, monks went to Britain, where the Anglo-Saxons were converted, under the leadership of St. Augustine (not to be confused with the theologian of the same name), who founded the first bishopric in the country.Other monks left Ireland, which had been Christianized, to convert the barbarians of northern England and the pagans of Scotland.These two currents evangelizers later would go into shock, because his teachings were not exactly the same.
The Anglo-Saxon monasteries became important cultural centers in the Middle Ages, not only because it preserved works of classical antiquity, but also for learning many of his monks. The most representative of the intellectual life of this period was Bede the Venerable, an Anglo-Saxon monk of Jarrow monastery.
England left numerous missionaries towards Germania where highlighted the work of St. Boniface; this later organize the Church among the Franks.
At the end of the sixth century, the Lombards (a Germanic people) invaded northern Italy. In the following century, they expanded their dominance in the region, and from 752, began to threaten Rome, whose de facto ruler was the pope, as bishop of the city. The Franks, led by Pepin the Short, rallied to the Pope for help.Pepin defeated the Lombards (756) and gave the Papacy the territories conquered in Central Itáiia. It was thus created the Patrimony of St. Peter (later Papal States), about which the pope had temporal power.
At the end of the sixth century, the Lombards (a Germanic people) invaded northern Italy. In the following century, they expanded their dominance in the region, and from 752, began to threaten Rome, whose de facto ruler was the pope, as bishop of the city. The Franks, led by Pepin the Short, rallied to the Pope for help.Pepin defeated the Lombards (756) and gave the Papacy the territories conquered in Central Itáiia. It was thus created the Patrimony of St. Peter (later Papal States), about which the pope had temporal power.
Links with the Franco State rising phase strengthened the Papacy, but at the same time colocaram- in the dependence of the Carolingian. Charlemagne, for example, often intervened in the selection of bishops. For the Church, this relationship has a positive aspect, because the secular state became interested inthe spread of the Christian faith among the heathen; but also had a negative side because it submitted the Papacy to temporal authority and encouraged the lay investiture (act by which a non-ecclesiastical authority as a king or emperor, appointed a bishop and empossava in the exercise of his ecclesiastical function). As a result, it increased the practice of simony (trafficking in sacred things and ecclesiastical offices) and Nicolaitanism (marriage or cohabitation of members of the clergy).
3. The organization of the Church
The evolution of ecclesiastical organization and the progress of evangelization in Europe (which expanded the area of pope's influence) are the basic factors to explain the reaction of the Church against the interference of the temporal power.
The Church was organized along the lines of a pontifical monarchy (one of the titles given to the Pope was the Pope). The bishops, who at first were elected by elders and approved by popular acclaim, have been chosen by the pope. To resolve issues that say about the Church in other countries, the Pope sent special representatives, the pontifical legacies.At the central level, the Roman Curia , divided into several departments, administered the vast empire of the Church.
The dome of the church hierarchy was part ofthe College of Cardinals , which from 1058 would elect the pope. The costs of the papal monarchy were covered with incomes of papal domains, with the remittance of funds by the dioceses and monasteries, with the taxes paid by the vassal states of the Papacy and the money of St. Peter - voluntary contributions of the faithful, collected in all Christendom.
The secular clergy was formed byarchbishops (heads of archdioceses or ecclesiastical provinces), the bishops (heads of dioceses) and the common priests. Below the bishops and above ordinary priests were the cures , who administered the parishes - local churches, erected in villages or in larger cities neighborhoods.
The regular clergy was formed by monks or friars, who lived communally in monasteries or convents. The smaller monasteries were subordinated to a larger, headed by an abbot.The regular clergy comprised numerous orders or congregations, each with its own rule (regulation) specific. The first rule for monks in Europe was drafted by St. Benedict, founder of the order of Benedictines.
In the tenth century began within the regular clergy a reform movement and moralizing that gave rise to the Cluny Order . This meant itself giving the example, encourage the regular clergy to resume the principles set out in São Bento rule (chastity, poverty, charity, obedience, prayer and work). Clunicenses were the monks who urged the Papacy to ward off the pernicious influence of the temporal power of the Church.
But the Cluny monasteries came to fall in the same profligacy of others, which caused the emergence of new reform movements. These, in turn, ended up focusing on the same faults, and then appeared other congregations imbued with the same ideals. One of the strictest rules was that of the Cistercians (orthe Cistercian Order ), founded by St. Bernard of Clairvaux.
In the thirteenth century, occurred within the regular clergy a major innovation: the rise of the mendicant orders , so called because they preached absolute poverty and lived off the charity of the faithful. The Franciscansoriginated from St. Francis of Assisi, the son of wealthy father but undid their material possessions to live in total simplicity (1210).The Dominicans come from Santo Domingo, a Spanish nobleman who founded a congregation dedicated to preaching with the faithful, in order to strengthen them in the Catholic faith (1215). These two orders produced in the Middle Ages great thinkers such as the Franciscan Roger Bacon and the Dominican Thomas Aquinas.
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Category: General history
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